Experimental impact of aspirin exposure on rat intestinal bacteria, epithelial cells and cell line

Aspirin, a commonly used therapeutic non-steroidal anti-inflammatory drug (NSAID) is known to cause gastric mucosal damage. Intestinal bacteria having a regulatory effect on intestinal homeostasis play significant role in NSAID-induced intestinal injury. Bacteria and specific cell lines are considered to be suitable for toxicity screening and testing of chemicals. Therefore, to evaluate and compare in vitro toxicity, cultures of rat intestinal epithelial cells (IEC), isolated bacteria and IEC-6 cell line were assessed for viability, morphometric analysis, membrane transport enzymes and structural constituents for membrane damage, dehydrogenase activity test for respiratory and energy producing processes and esterase activity test for intra- and extra-cellular degradation, following the post exposure to aspirin (0-50 µg mL(- 1)). Similar pattern of dose-dependent changes in these parameters were observed in three types of cells. Similar in situ effects on IEC validated the in vitro findings. These findings indicate that higher aspirin concentrations may alter cellular functions of IEC and gut bacteria. Furthermore, results suggest that gut bacteria and IEC-6 cell line can be used for the initial screening of gastrointestinal cellular toxicity caused by NSAIDs.